We headed to Currumbin Beach for the annual SWELL SCULPTURE FESTIVAL. What makes this unique is that the art work is installed on the beach and the boardwalks of Currumbin Beach. This year, more on the Boardwalk due to the damage from Cyclone Errol. It’s on from the 12th to the 21st of September. There are lots of fringe events happening too, and its lively and full of fun and creativity.

If there is one thing I am never sure of, is the descriptive language used for the art work. Sometimes it leaves you more in the dark then before you read it – so I will spare you those metaphors for life, the transcendence and reflections, the evocations and interplays.

These are the ones which appealed to me from about 80 on show.

Top marks to Michael Brown with “Dream Rider” made from recycled surfboards and epoxy resin among other materials.

Philip Piperides “Bathers” was magical set against the seascape.

While Claudia Hickels “Daydream” was just evocative of that serenity we all feel in nature sometimes. The warmth of the sun on our bodies.

Bill Dormans “Adrift” was just stunning. Bowed heads and broken masts to speak of the enduring hardship of migrants.

Artists De Lamby Wulff and Peter Tinney collaborated on this fun creation, two enormous knitting needles hand crafted from salvaged ironbark trees. A giant scarf is forming made of three kilometres of retired fishing rope. A nod to Peter’s great grandmother and the wonderful things they got up to in the Queensland Country Women’s Association which she led.

Mike Van den Bergs “Mystic Passage” embarks on an adventure. Ocean waves made of discarded crab pots and crocheted embellished sails.

Michael Van Dams “Kill a Koala” – trees cut down which could have been koala habitats.

Jan Brown’s “Chrysalis’. I loved their colours and forms.

Charlie’s favourite was the dung beetle. Chainsaw Newton from NSW. He called it “Roll models”. A monumental dung beetle is pushing a sphere of recycled waste, an ode to nature’s original recyclers.

Another Charlie – Trivers, produced “Forever for now”. The language to describe this piece is : “This sculpture is a dissonance of two different sources to the sculptors own biomorphic language” …. whatever that means. Its quite beautiful and skilful.

And to end this post what better than the “Anti Gloom Portal” with two very happy people in its midst. Courtesy of a passer by and the work of Nicci Parry Jones and Steve Morgan.